


Tiny TARDIS Bedtime Stories

by lunaseemoony



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Adoption, Children, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Orphans, POV TARDIS, Post-Episode: s04e13 Journey's End, TARDIS Coral
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-06
Updated: 2016-09-06
Packaged: 2018-08-13 08:13:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7969171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunaseemoony/pseuds/lunaseemoony
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The baby TARDIS reflects on finding a kindred spirit and companion in one of the orphans the Doctor and Rose recently adopted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tiny TARDIS Bedtime Stories

**Author's Note:**

> These children are based on three very real ones I cared for in my work at a daycare, with names changed to conceal their identities. With only some details changed, the kids’ story is more or less the same. Though that story didn’t end happily, this one very much has. These kids will be back for a proper fic later.

At three years and eight months, Faith was the eldest of the three children the TARDIS’s humans had brought home ten days ago. She was also the one that had gotten the least amount of sleep. Having a 19-month old sister and 3-month old brother made this quite the feat. But in Faith’s defense, the TARDIS had gathered that for the first time in her short life she had nobody to care for but herself.

Nobody understood this sentiment more than the TARDIS herself. With all of the memories of taking care of her Time Lord and her Rose reminding her of her current state of uselessness she’d become restless. She wasn’t sad about this, mind you. In the past three years she’d had a front row seat to her two idiots’ timeless romance rekindling as she fully expected it to. Their smiles could have easily been the only fuel she needed for growth. They hadn’t planned or discussed children at all yet. They’d only just gotten married. A twist of fate had made this decision for them. The TARDIS didn’t know how it happened, simply that the three little humans had come home with hers one day, and that they were here to stay. But the eldest of the little ones filled her in.

To Rose’s and the Doctor’s credit, they did put the child to sleep every night. The TARDIS could feel her breaths easing but her mind remained as busy as a beehive. By day ten Faith had it all worked out. When Rose and the Doctor turned in for the night she slipped out of bed and into the living room where the TARDIS’s tank resided. Every night she would prop her tiny arms on the table and stare into the tank, relaying to the TARDIS her own stories in her delicate, squeaky soft voice. The child knew very little about what the coral was, simply that one day the man desperately hoping for her to call him father had told her the small bit of coral would grow and take her to see the stars. Being an impressionable and innocent young mind, she believed him and became entranced.

The feeling was mutual. It had been so achingly long since a child had stepped foot aboard her TARDIS. After Faith told her bits of her family’s story every night, the TARDIS determined that nobody deserved a trip to the farthest reaches of the universe more than she did. If young humans were better coordinated, their imagination and the purest sense of wonder would make them the best of TARDIS pilots. It wasn’t even an exaggeration.

Nobody should have to sacrifice their childhood for another. Weaved into every word of Faith’s bedtime stories to the TARDIS was a boundless love for her brother and sister. Without a mother and a rarely appearing father to tell her she was responsible for them, Faith made this determination herself. She made sure they were fed and clothed. According to her, their babysitter was as useful in caring for them as her tattered doll on the floor.

A carefully crafted twist of fate brought the Doctor and Rose to Faith and her siblings after an alien attack left them orphans. That entire ordeal is a story for another time. Suffice it to say the TARDIS’s pair of humans with hearts of gold saw an easy solution to the dilemma of where to house the three orphans.

As Faith had told the TARDIS, she didn’t even really mind that her siblings had gotten more attention than she had in the week they’d been in their new home. The Doctor and Rose cared for them equally, she could tell. Her siblings simply needed the attention more. Amelia had become permanently glued to the Doctor’s hip and Charley needed a lot by virtue of his age. What Faith did mind was no longer having a job. She couldn’t rest until she knew her brother and sister were all right. And even then, the change had rocked her to the core. Feeling safe and secure took getting used to, particularly in a new home. If the TARDIS had a human heart it would have broken several times over for this child.

Without even realizing it, however, she was becoming accustomed to being truly loved, cared for, and part of a proper family. On that tenth night when the Doctor and Rose once again came around to check on their little nighttime wanderer they found her curled up in a little ball on the floor in front of the tank. By then they’d stopped going to her bedroom first, knowing well enough to expect her to be with the tiny TARDIS telling her stories. She finally grew tired that night. Still restless, but just relaxed enough to nod off on her own.

With his fresh human heart full, the Doctor scooped up the little girl and carried her off to bed with his wife softly grinning at his side. He mumbled about how on Earth to keep their eldest in bed. Why did she keep going to the tank every night, he asked in bemusement? Were his own bedtime stories too fantastic and keep her awake? He wanted so desperately to succeed. It filled Rose with a wealth of pride that bloomed in her every smile. Naturally she was the one to make a suggestion for a solution.

Faith still needed someone to care for. Her inner mother couldn’t easily be quelled. The next day, the Doctor moved the TARDIS’s tank into her bedroom. The Doctor had been doing all the work assuring his pride and joy was growing as he expected her to. But Faith’s job was equally important. She spoke to the TARDIS, expecting nothing in return but the comforting blue glow from her tank every night easing her to sleep. She never wondered when the TARDIS would make good on the Doctor’s promise to take her to the stars. If her new parents had done nothing else right, they’d planted the seeds of hope and trust. They grew and weaved around her already strong sense of family and love. Just as they were perfect for her, she was a perfect match for them. The TARDIS firmly believed she’d make a wonderful pilot some day.


End file.
